{"title":"Wealth and Insurance Choices: Evidence from U.S. Households","authors":"MICHAEL J. GROPPER, CAMELIA M. KUHNEN","doi":"10.1111/jofi.13426","DOIUrl":null,"url":null,"abstract":"<div>\n \n <p>Using administrative data for 63,000 individuals across 2,500,000 person-month observations, we find that wealthier individuals have better life insurance coverage, controlling for the value of the asset insured, namely, the consumption needs of dependents. This positive wealth-insurance correlation, which is surprising given the prevailing view that wealth substitutes for insurance, persists after allowing for wealth-related differences in risk or bequest preferences, pricing, background risk, education, employment, or liquidity constraints. Our findings call for further investigation of this wealth-coverage correlation but support theories emphasizing the consumption-smoothing role of insurance across not only states of the world, but also time.</p></div>","PeriodicalId":15753,"journal":{"name":"Journal of Finance","volume":"80 2","pages":"1127-1170"},"PeriodicalIF":7.6000,"publicationDate":"2025-01-30","publicationTypes":"Journal Article","fieldsOfStudy":null,"isOpenAccess":false,"openAccessPdf":"","citationCount":"0","resultStr":null,"platform":"Semanticscholar","paperid":null,"PeriodicalName":"Journal of Finance","FirstCategoryId":"96","ListUrlMain":"https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1111/jofi.13426","RegionNum":1,"RegionCategory":"经济学","ArticlePicture":[],"TitleCN":null,"AbstractTextCN":null,"PMCID":null,"EPubDate":"","PubModel":"","JCR":"Q1","JCRName":"BUSINESS, FINANCE","Score":null,"Total":0}
引用次数: 0
Abstract
Using administrative data for 63,000 individuals across 2,500,000 person-month observations, we find that wealthier individuals have better life insurance coverage, controlling for the value of the asset insured, namely, the consumption needs of dependents. This positive wealth-insurance correlation, which is surprising given the prevailing view that wealth substitutes for insurance, persists after allowing for wealth-related differences in risk or bequest preferences, pricing, background risk, education, employment, or liquidity constraints. Our findings call for further investigation of this wealth-coverage correlation but support theories emphasizing the consumption-smoothing role of insurance across not only states of the world, but also time.
期刊介绍:
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